‘Drone strikes remarkably ineffective in countering terrorism’

Smoke rises after an U.S.-led air strike in the Syrian town of Kobani Ocotber 8, 2014. (Reuters/Umit Bektas) / Reuters

The US drone campaign against ISIS has been a failure. It created an illusion that Americans can engage in countering terrorism without a big loss of life, but only boots on the ground can make it a success, says Max Abrahms of Northeastern University.

RT:The US led
coalition has carried out numerous strikes on Islamic State
positions, but the terror group seems to remain defiant. Does
this indicate that Western nations are fighting the organization
the wrong way?

Max Abrahms: Yes, I agree with that. Since 2008
the cornerstone of US counter terrorism has been a drone
campaign. It is easy to understand why the country might be
tempted to use a drone campaign. The basic idea is that we can
weaken a militant group by taking out the leadership with this
drone technology. But in practice drone strikes have been
remarkably ineffective at basically doing what they are supposed
to.

There are all sorts of research on the strategic effect of
drones. People have looked at it whether using drones, expedite
the demise of militant groups, whether it reduces their ability
to generate violence, whether the attacks become more infrequent.
In general I’m not persuaded by the research suggesting that
drones are an effective strategy- they’ve been a failure
certainly with Islamic State, but also with al Qaeda, Taliban,
al-Shabaab, AQAP [al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula]. Yet, we
stick to this strategy. I think one of the reasons why we do is
because it creates the illusion that Americans can engage in
counter terrorism without a big loss of life…When we use drones
there maybe collateral damage but at least there aren’t boots on
the ground - I think that is what the Obama administration is
counting on. In reality for counter insurgency, or counter
terrorism to be successful you need boots on the ground.

In some cases it can be helpful to have drones, but always you
need boots on the ground. That is one of the reasons why our
counter insurgency campaign in Iraq is going much better than it
is in Syria… In Iraq, yes, we were using some airpower, but were
also be very reliant on Shia militia on the ground there who were
absolutely indispensable to retaking Tikrit.

In the US many Americans have contempt and fear for the Shia
militia because some of them have ties with Iran. But in reality
we should be grateful to the Shia militia - they don’t always act
in accordance with US preferences but the Tikrit operation simply
would not have gone as well without their critical support. By
contrast, in Syria we’re relying on our drones, airpower, but we
don’t really have boots on the ground with the exception of in
Kobani. And when we use airpower with boots on the ground and the
Kurds helped us out in that one city we were also successful…

RT:The coalition's actions against the
Islamic State were not agreed on with the Syrian government, so
the fight against the terrorists is not coordinated. Why has it
not been coordinated?

MA: As far back as August of last year I wrote
an op-ed in The New York times advocating for the Assad
regime to work with Washington because we have a mutual enemy in
Islamic State. If there were that kind of collaboration, the US
would’ve been very helpful with airpower and the Assad regime we
would have benefited from their boots on the ground, from their
army. Together we would have been much more successful at
combating IS.

But there was this notion in the US that the Assad regime
“had blood on his hands,” that it wasn’t a democratic
country, and he was reportedly guilty of all sorts of abuses
against the civilian population. Thus, for moral reasons rather
than strategic reasons the Obama administration said that not
only can we not work with the Assad regime but the Assad regime
has to go. Increasingly it is becoming obvious that the Assad
regime is not going to disappear any time soon. So Washington is
relaxing its language with respect to whether we could ever
coexist with Assad. Although still actual military cooperation
between the Assad regime and the US is pretty much non-existent.
That contrast very starkly with US relations with Shia militia on
the ground in Iraq. The latest assaults on Tikrit in order to win
back that city from IS was very much a joint operation between
the Iranians, the Shia, Iraq, the military in Baghdad coupled
with the US airstrikes. It is very interesting that Washington is
so opposed to working with the Assad regime but seems much less
hesitant with respect to working with the Iranians (Shias) which
are a close ally of Assad in Iraq.

RT:Islamic State is advancing in Syria's
Yarmouk region and has taken most of one of the refugee camps
with civilians being forced to flee. Will the impact on civilians
make the coalition review the way it tries to fight Islamic
State?

MA: Right now the Assad regime is providing some
relief to the Yarmouk refugee camp. That could win over allies in
the Muslim world because, let’s face it- not just in a Muslim
world but in the international community people have very
conflictive views about the Assad regime. Now the IS and al-Nusra
have invaded this Palestinian refugee camp and harmed civilians,
etc. - that makes the Assad regime look comparatively better. I
think that it’s a strong PR move by the Assad regime to try to
lend some relief to these refuges. One of the very interesting
things about what happened on Wednesday when IS went into Yarmouk
camp - is that they went in the camp with the assistance of
al-Nusra, the Al- Qaeda affiliate there. Increasingly they are
working together.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.